Judy Valencia, 30, is an employment specialist at Catholic Charities, a nonprofit organization aiming to reduce poverty on the national level. She is an advocate for strengthening the "human contact" between employer and job-seekers. She also talks about the disadvantages of moving the job application process online.

Peyton Herbert and Alicia Acosta-Mahone, housing counselors at the nonprofit HomeFree-USA in Hyattsville, Md., explain the unwavering high demand for housing counseling. More government cuts for these assistance programs take effect this fall.

A union representative from the Bronx shares the city's struggle in keeping its employees on payroll. From its libraries to its law enforcement agency, layoffs are occurring across the board, says Phyllis Streeter.

Children come and go to Melanie Collins' home on a daily basis. Parents drop them off on their way to work and pick them up on their way home, but when a parent loses his or her job, Collins' services go unneeded. And it hurts to know the challenges that family must now live with.

A Cleveland teacher shares his school's struggle as Ohio's budget deficit mounts. Justin Hons said in October that stimulus money helped stymie the schools' suffering last year, but now, the Cleveland schools are sending warning signs this upcoming school year must face the cuts.

Donald Barlett and James Steele are revisiting America: What Went Wrong, their landmark 1991 newspaper series, in a new project with the Investigative Reporting Workshop. Over the next year, the project team will examine how four decades of public policy has shaped America's ongoing economic crisis.

We feature charts, maps, photos and other visualizations that reflect the state of the economy as part of our What Went Wrong project. This column chart shows the growing disparity between what individuals and corporations pay in taxes. In the 1950s, the difference was 22 percent. Recent figures show the difference is 62 percent.

Florida, as a center of the housing boom, still struggles to recover from the Great Recession. Financial stresses and widespread foreclosures have placed families in precarious situations, resulting in a spike in child homelessness. Susannah Nesmith reports in the Broward Bulldog.

An advanced degree and experience in the tech sector should be a ticket to a job in today's economy. But older workers in the heart of the new economy, Silicon Valley, are finding their resume is not the issue. Aaron Glantz reports in The Bay Citizen.